Biblische Ausbildung

Welcome to the Wonderful World of the Old Testament / Hebrew Bible! Enjoy these postings of resources, projects by my students, movies and images, links, reflections, humor, and other items related to teaching the Bible at a Flagship Seminary. This blog is interactive: You can add your comments and post your questions. Go ahead, it's fun...

Tuesday, June 07, 2016

M. Girón: Images of Prophetic Themes

This spring my student M. Girón reflected on many biblical prophetic texts and drew these three images of prophetic themes for our Prophets seminar. They are based on the work of three different photographers. Here they are with her commentary, in her own words.

“A woman stares into the unknown. I wanted to portray a woman with a child (one that you can barely make out because I wanted to make a comment on the fact that society doesn’t see the least of these). The woman is an African American woman, and I was intentional in that, because I wanted to call attention to the Black Lives Matter movement (to this mother, her child matters and as she sits reflecting, I wanted to capture her pensive look which could mean she is thinking about her very life and that of her child’s).”

“A boy draws water from a river. Throughout scripture, God is associated with springs, streams, water, and therefore, with life. I wanted to depict a child going to a stream to get water, because I believe it captures the concept of God as a living stream. There is nothing around the child – I was intentional in leaving out anything surrounding the child because this emptiness is how the image of water is sometimes used throughout scripture, it is a bearer of life in a land that is dry, a wilderness, barren.”

“A woman is looking at some grain in her hands, she has food, she has life in her hands. I wanted to draw an image that captured what it means to be grateful for life and to be grateful for having sustenance. Throughout scripture, God is a creator who gives life and a God who calls us to care for one another in order for us to have life.”

Duties of a son, from The Story of Aqhat: To erect a stele for his ancestral gods; to build a family shrine in the sanctuary;
to guard his footsteps from earth to underworld; to take his hand when he is drunk; to put his arm over one's shoulder when he is full of
wine; to eat a funeral meal in the temple of Ba'al; to offer a sacrifice in the house of El.